It has long been a dream of mine to run a flower farm and use the flowers to create captivating arrangements.

When I look back on my life, I have always been connected to gardens and growing, and would always favour being outside in nature. I have been inspired by my mother who spent countless hours in the gardens where I grew up. My brother and I would roam freely, picking fruit and vegetables and gradually absorbing names of flowers. I only now fully appreciate the richness of this upbringing, in the very beautiful gardens we were surrounded by.

I grew up in a number of houses in Wiltshire and then Devon, always surrounded by lovely gardens. My father had grown up in a house in Somerset with seven acres of land, a small holding with a vegetable garden, orchard, nut grove and a large flower garden. His mother was an incredibly keen gardener and they grew all their own fruit and vegetables, as well as keeping chickens, ducks and geese.

Space outside was therefore very important for my father. My mother, by comparison, had been working in London until they married, but she couldn’t wait to have her own garden, so as small children we were used to spending lots of time outside, often waiting for supper whilst she spent “another ten minutes” working in the flower bed before she came into start cooking.

It wasn’t until 2006 that I had my very own garden and immediately filled it with cuttings from my mother.

I am at my most fulfilled when I’m growing and tending plants.

I have had a long and very fulfilling career as a cancer nurse practitioner, but the niggling feeling to set up my flower farm took hold more than ever following the Covid pandemic. The garden has and always will be a place for me to feel calm and recentered.

Wood Lane flowers was sown years ago in my head, and it is now that I get to invest my time and passion in growing flowers as a business.

My husband, son and I live in a cottage in Broadhembury. We have a large garden that I created 12 years ago, packed with an array of flowers and foliage and a poly tunnel bursting with seedlings. I now have an additional plot of land in the village, protected with beautiful old trees, a sanctuary for wildlife. Between these two spaces I grow a large selection of foliage, perennial, annual and biennial flowers.